


Last ride

by Fauna96



Series: Other Places [2]
Category: Bartimaeus - Jonathan Stroud
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bart is here to help, Everyone lives and is happy, Gen, Modern Era, Ptol tries to run away from home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-08 14:59:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8849449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fauna96/pseuds/Fauna96
Summary: - Run away from home? –Ptolemy starts. – What? –- Have you run away from home? – the voice repeats. A tall and confident figure emerges from the dark, leaning against the bench which Ptolemy is sitting on waiting for the bus.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This work is a translation of the original I've written in Italian. No beta-reading, so eventual mistakes are all mine.

**Last ride**

 

\- Run away from home? –

Ptolemy starts. – What? –

\- Have you run away from home? – the voice repeats. A tall and confident figure emerges from the dark, leaning against the bench which Ptolemy is sitting on waiting for the bus.

Ptolemy cracks a smile. – Is it that obvious, eh? –

The guy laughs. – I don’t see what else a twelve-years-old could been doing at 8 in the evening with a bag at the bus stop -.

\- I’m fourteen years, though –

The guy doesn’t seem embarrassed by the gaffe. – Are they making you so much small, now? –

Ptolemy shrugs without taking offence and he sits down beside.

\- You’ve chosen the wrong hour -.

Ptolemy tilts the head shutting the book he was reading closed. – Why? –

\- You should have left at lunch time. Or in the afternoon, when there is more coming and going. A kid at night draws always more attention, I’m telling you for experience – the guy pulls out a lighter and a little crooked cigarette.

Ptolemy suddenly is feeling very little and very stupid. He’s right, clearly. What was he thinking to do, clod as he is?

Actually, he didn’t want to run away _seriously._ Just leaving for some days, to break off from the chaos that is his house.

The guy next to him takes a puff and offers him the cigarette. – Wanna? –

Ptolemy is going to say no, but then changes his mind about it: if he wants to do well this _rebel_ thing, he might as well do it.

The cigarette seems to him very much bitter and his mouth fills up with saliva; he spits out the smoke and the guy slaps him on the back. – First time stinks a little. Like everything, after all -.

Ptolemy pulls back his hair from the eyes and asks: - Have you run away, too, when you were younger? –

The guy furrows his forehead; he must be twenty-something, but he has eyes full of things, or it seems so to Ptolemy.

\- I haven’t, I’ve just idled a lot on my own, at night too. At mine’s they wouldn’t even have noticed I’ve gone out – he shakes his head. – At yours they would, instead. Otherwise you wouldn’t even have left, would you? –

\- Not really – he replies. – Just when it’s convenient for them -.

He winces when the guy’s hand brush against his swollen cheekbone. – I see -.

Ptolemy doesn’t know what to say, but he’s taken away from embarrassment by the noise and the headlights of the coming bus.

\- I’m going, then. Thanks... for the company -.

The guy throws the stub on the ground and stands up with him. – You don’t mind if I’m coming with you, then? – Ptolemy blinks. – I mean, I can’t leave a twelve years old strolling on his own at night, can I? –

In Ptolemy’s mind the thousands of warnings he’s always received slide, such as don’t talk with strangers, least of all going on the road with them all-night-long. But he can’t see that black-curled guy as a psychopath or a human beings trader. The only objection he manages to find is: - I don’t even know your name -.

He laughs. – Right. My name is Bartimaeus. Bart, if you want to – he offers him his hand, a foot already on the bus. Ptolemy returns the smile. – Ptolemy.

**Author's Note:**

> So.. this is the first story of a Modern AU series, "Other Places", that I'll translate and post here. Nothing much to say, except that Ptol is very, very smart and clever except for pratical things, Bart is the bad boy who shows him the 'real life'. Anyway, Ptolemy isn't mistreated, just his cousins doing the big and not-very-nice guys. I think that he took some beating in Alexandria, too, because a prince must be ready for war...?


End file.
